A woman was taken to hospital after being batoned by police during a protest in Montpellier, southern France, on Saturday May 16.
Although the demo had been banned by the authorities, hundreds of people courageously gathered in the city centre.
They were expressing their anger at the authoritarian neoliberal Macron regime, not least for its handling of the covid crisis and the police-state measures being used to suppress free speech and assembly.
Riot police were sent in when protesters blocked the tram lines in the Place de la Comédie. As the armoured cops waded into the crowd wielding their batons, the woman fell injured to ground and did not get up.
Street medics treated her on the scene and she was later stretchered into an ambulance to be taken to hospital, as shocked locals looked on.
There were shouts of “fascists!”, “everybody hates the police!” and “police everywhere, justice nowhere!”
The protest was one of many held across France on Saturday. It had been called by the local Gilets Jaunes, but they were joined by others opposing the current virus-based totalitarianism.
An anti-militarist newsletter was distributed, along with a leaflet calling for a popular insurrection against the French state.
One placard quoted George Orwell to the effect that dictatorship thrives on ignorance.
Another declared: “We were here yesterday, we are here today, we will be here tomorrow, until victory. We won’t give up! We will win back all our rights!”
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